Auburn's crows will likely be heading out for the season in the next few weeks, and it appears as though the city's hazing programs over the last two years have been the most effective in the state.

The city's halved crow population from last year to this year has not been seen by any of the other city in the state using the USDA Wildlife Services crow hazing treatment program.

Richard Chipman, the USDA's state director of wildlife services, said some of that could be attributed to the sheer amount of time the USDA spent treating the crows in Auburn.

Rather than just doing a five-day intensive treatment and a handful of spot treatments thereafter, the USDA returned numerous times for follow-up treatments. That said, it's far too soon to declare the hazing treatments a complete success. Chipman said it's possible Auburn's full 64,000-count roost could return next winter.

“It was a pleasant surprise to see what happened in Auburn,” Chipman said. “Historically, this roost has been there for many, many years. My hope is that (an increase next year) won't happen. But that wouldn't be a big surprise to anybody.”

The USDA has taken on crow hazing in five cities, adding Watertown to the program this year. The first city to get on board was Troy in 2001. The roost in Troy typically hovers around 20,000, and though the treatments have been going on for five years, the roost has not decreased dramatically and has even seen slight increases in some years.

In Albany, Chipman said moving the crows is a constant battle each year. Albany, which hosts a roost of about 25,000, joined the program a year after Troy.

“If anything I'd say it's been more of a struggle to move them out,” Chipman said, of the USDA's experiences in Albany this year. “As long as they're not bopping back into the city, it's no hazard. But, boy, they want to come back in.”

The crow roost in Albany sets up shop in an area around the SUNY-Albany campus, which creates a problem for the college. The intention is to move them to a lower-impact area, and the USDA has found that in a wooded area along Interstate 90. This year, however, the crows continued to filter back to the campus, Chipman said.

If the team doesn't move the birds far enough away from their original roost, Chipman said they may be tempted to return.

“They may say ‘Let's see if it's OK to be at SUNY-Albany again,'” he said.

Auburn also saw crows filter back following the initial weeklong treatment at the beginning of January. The biggest difference from the other crow communities was Auburn's initial roost this year was half of what it was last year.

“There were no dramatic swings in any of the other roosts,” he said. “We saw equal numbers at all the other sites.”

Utica, which has a much smaller roost than Auburn, hovering around 8,000 birds, has been using the USDA hazing program for three years. While the city thinks highly of the program, Johanna Brenon, secretary in Utica's mayor's office, said some residents would prefer to see the birds gone forever.

“It works well. The residents don't always cooperate well,” Brenon said. “They think what they do is not good enough. They think (the crows) should be shot.”

Though the crows have consistently returned to Utica year after year, Brenon said the program is effective in moving the roost out of the city after they return. The city has come to terms with the fact that USDA crow hazing will be a part of Utica's annual budget for many years to come, she said.

When Utica first started using the program, it was the third city in the state to do so. This year, however, Brenon realized the city would need to do better at booking the USDA in advance considering the growing number of cities using the program.

“I thought we could book them overnight,” she said.

Instead, the city ended up having to wait a month before biologists with the program could start the treatments - and that created a less-than-pleasant situation with some of the city's residents.

Ken Preusser, another USDA biologist, said the organization has been in talks with other cities across the state, but the biologists have been enlisted in just the five cities.

While Chipman and other biologists with the USDA have a good sense for where Troy's and Albany's crows go after being hazed - largely to the wooded area by the interstate - since this is only the USDA's second year working in Auburn, Chipman said it would only be guesswork trying to determine where Auburn's crows went this year. They likely scattered throughout the area in smaller flocks.

While some have postulated that Auburn's crows flew to Geneva, Syracuse or other surrounding cities, Chipman said if all of the 30,000 crows in the city's roost had actually gone to any one of those cities, it would have been very obvious.

While the USDA received a few calls from Syracuse this year with concerns about incoming crows, Chipman said the reality is that both Syracuse and Geneva also have historic crow roosts, so it would take a lot more tracking and research to determine whether Auburn's hazing actually pushed its crows to those cities.

This year, Auburn was the first city in the state to partner with the USDA in training eight department of public works employees in hazing techniques, at a cost of $13,711. City workers completed what could be their final spot treatment last week.

Chipman said no more than 10,000 crows ever returned to Auburn following January's intensive treatment. Those that did return tended to hover not around the original roost near the Owasco Outlet, but instead near the Seward House and surrounding area.

“This year, we were really able to move them out of the city and keep them out,” he said.

But how the program will work next year is yet to be determined.

“We just have to be ready to work,” Chipman said.

Staff writer Anne Gleason can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 248 or at anne.gleason@lee.net